Good morning to you one and all. I'd like to thank you for joining us for the publication of 2022 full year results. We're particularly pleased to welcome you here in our Sèvres store, which we enlarged in March 2021. It's the location of the previous the Lutetia swimming pool. You can even see the gutters, the drainage channels from the former pool here. After a record 2021, I'm proud and pleased to present to you the excellent 2022 results. Our very strong Q4 closed a very beautiful year. I'd like to thank all teams in France and worldwide for their enthusiasm, their creativity, their know-how, and their entrepreneurial spirit.
Our strong performance, both in terms of increased revenue and earnings, are a reflection of the desirability of our creations in all the métiers, which show the strength of our business model, which is sustainable and responsible, highly integrated, and anchored in the various territories. We doubled our headcount in a 10-year period, where over 60% of job creations took place in France. I'd remind you, that's where we make around 80% of our items at our 52 production sites. Over a three-year period, Hermès boosted operational investments by EUR 1.5 billion, about 60% of which also in France. After two increases of EUR 100 for French employees and a payment of a bonus of EUR 3,000 to all employees in 2022, a new EUR 4,000 bonus will be paid at the end of the month. It's been announced.
We're highly confident in moving toward 2023. In spite of uncertainties, we reassert our commitments to CSR. Our commitments have been well greeted by the ratings agencies. Let's talk about the highlights now. 2022 was a highly creative year, thanks to the talent of our creative teams, led by Pierre-Alexis Dumas in the front row. He's entitled to the front row this year. Yes. Let's mention a couple of examples of creativity. The leather collection success of the R.M.S. suitcase and the Kelly en Désordre models, as well as the Eau Courroies Rock and Getta. Also, men and women's apparel, very successful. 2022, fourth chapter of beauty, the Plein Air foundation for makeup. We're very pleased to see the great momentum in our watches and jewelry activities. Think of the Arceau watch, the Temps Voyageur.
They got 2 awards at the Geneva Watchmakers, Grand Prize. The new collection of high jewelry, which has already been highly successful, Les Jeux d'Ombres. We're very attached to transmission of know-how. We continue investing in our production capacities, therefore. We've got a rationale based on centers of excellence, both for leather as well as other métiers, true growth drivers. In 2022, we laid the first stone of the Riom, leather site in the Puy-de-Dôme in September, and works begun in Louviers, which is Normandy, as well as Sormonne, which is in the Ardennes. Work's continued at those leather sites for opening in 2023. Capacity investment has been boosted in all the métiers to support strong growth in the group. I'd mention work that's been done at the Lyon textile cluster, Pierre-Bénite, and think of J3L, that makes metal parts.
Let's talk about our retail network, which is integrated, omnichannel and exclusive. We've continued to make operational investments so that we can continue being highly visible in city centers, providing ever more services to our customers, and also having a good geography balance. Remember in 2022, we opened the new Hermès Maison at 706 Madison Avenue, New York. You can see a photo of it here. A true success. We also extended our retail network to Zhengzhou and Shanghai, Xintiandi in China, Pangyo in Korea. I'd also mention amongst the many renovations and enlargements, Strasbourg, very successful. Also I'd mention Barcelona and Dubai.
2022 was also marked by the resumption of travel retail and our store at the Hong Kong Airport was renovated and enlarged, and it opened its doors in November. In an unstable environment, our teams have shown dynamism and creativity to adapt to the situation in Greater China, and our e-commerce network pursues its strong development. The latter allows us to receive new customers in an omnichannel logic with a strong performance everywhere in the world. The success of collections and our products have led us to strengthen our logistics chain to serve all the stores, including e-commerce. Creativity of Hermès is expressed also through the 17th métier of Hermès, that of communication.
In 2022, with events open to public all over the world, we wish to tell you about the spirit, creativity, know-how of the world of Hermès with the encounter of artisans, for example, with the event called Hermès in the Making, or the discovery of the world of Hermès with the roving kiosks in London, Dubai, and Toronto. We also plunged our public into the 16 sectors of the house, for example, that of silk with the Kite Festival. You see a photograph of it here, and Petit h in Dubai and Bangkok. Hermès pursues its commitment as a responsible employer. The group has accelerated its job creation in 2022 with the recruitment of 2,100 persons, of which 1,400 people in France in all the métiers of the house.
After an increase of EUR 100 gross monthly, in January and July in France, the payment of a bonus of EUR 3,000 in February, we've announced a new bonus of EUR 4,000 for all the employees worldwide. To accompany the growth of our activities, training our employees, and exceptional know-how and rolling out trainings. 2022 was the launch of the School of Artisans of Sale and a new center of training of apprentices of École Hermès in the Ardennes regional center, where we'll be giving the diploma called the CAP Maroquinerie. In 2022, the house continued its actions to strengthen inclusion and diversity. The special mention in More women in top management, in management positions, as rated by SBF 120 companies. The exceptional progression of non-financial ratings, the decarbonization for all the métiers.
We have the emissions of scope one and two and all the emissions related to transport, thanks to high of environmental and corporate value. Responsible construction reference system will allow us to reduce the greenhouse gas of generated by new constructions. Our commitment for the preservation of biodiversity is being pursued by a diagnosis of 75% of leather workshops and production sites. The durability of objectives is something that's important. 2,200 repairs have been done by artisans in the world, reflecting the desirability of Hermès objects in the long term. The exceptional progression of Hermès, non-financial and showed the CSR commitment. The Sustainalytics, the.
First of all, the AA rating on MSCI, the Sustainalytics ranking as first actor among apparel and luxury integration and the A-list of the CDP. Coming now to the activity. The very beautiful momentum of sales has led us to EUR 11.6 billion in sales, a rise by 29% at constant rate, 23% at constant rates. The growth of sales, which is remarkable in all regions, has been seen in each quarter. The strong growth of wholesale, +26% at constant rates, thanks to strong recovery of travel retail. Fourth quarter, the sales continue their strong momentum and rise up to EUR 3 billion in September. Look at geographical development. In 2022, the growth of sales is remarkable in all geographical areas and the progression of double-digit growth. In France, we are at +27%.
In Europe, excluding France, at +18%, have pursued a solid growth with a strong demand of local customers as well as international customers. Japan, +20%, recording and progression of sustained and regular sales. Asia, excluding Japan, +22%, has carried forward through the strong momentum of all of the region, including Australia, Korea, and Singapore. Sales in Greater China have had sustained strong sales, especially in second and fourth quarter. America, finally, exceptional year, sustained by the opening of the stores in Austin and Texas in the spring and Madison, 706, end of September. The geographical breakdown remains balanced. Let us now look at the activity by métier.
All métiers have confirmed their strong dynamic with the remarkable progression of watches, apparel and accessories, and other métiers of Hermès, that is to say, jewelry and the home, the house. The growth of leather goods, +16%, is exceptional. It is supported by sustained demand and the increase of production capacity in line with our objectives, which are unchanged. It has benefited from a favorable baseline for comparison in Q4. Ready-to-wear accessories, +36%, continued its momentum, thanks to the collections of ready-to-wear fashion accessories and shoes. The new creations encountered a strong success alongside the iconics of Hermès. Silk and textiles, +20%, had a very good performance for women's silk as well as men's silk, namely thanks to the exploration of exceptional materials.
Hermès Perfumes and Beauty, plus 15%, benefited from the success of the launches of a new chapter of beauty and new creations for perfumes such as Eau de Basilic Pourpre and Terre d'Hermès Eau Givrée. Watches, plus 46%, made up a remarkable performance, thanks to the development of pieces with exceptional know-how, such as Arceau Le Temps Voyageur watch, the success of H08 watch, and its pillars such as Heure H and Cape Cod. Finally, other métiers of Hermès, plus 30%, jewelry and the home, continued their strong dynamic movement, putting light on the singularity and its creativity. Soleil d'Hermès for the tableware and the seventh collection of Haute Bijouterie des Jeux de Rome, which I've already mentioned. The changes in the breakdown of the sector showed a strong progression of ready-to-wear and accessory in other métiers.
Leather goods continued its strong growth in line with its objectives. I now give the floor to Éric du Halgouët, CFO, who will present the results to you.
Thank you, Axel. Good morning, everyone. The wonderful sales momentum in H1 continued in the second half of the year, during which the group further increased its hiring, its investment, and boosted its communication spend. Full year 2022, growth in sales and earnings are exceptional. Revenue up 29%. Recurring operating income up 33%. Net income +38%. This chart illustrates the very strong recovery in revenue and net income in 2021 and in 2022. Over a 10-year period, the CAGR of revenue and net income is respectively +13% and +16%. At constant exchange rates, growth in sales is 23%, and as in 2021, it's particularly virtuous. The price effect is 4%, slightly above previous years.
Impact of currency on revenue is the result of a conversion effect, is significant, representing six points, which is over EUR 500 million. Growth in the value of sales between 2021 and 2022 is EUR 2.6 billion. Like in the first half, the slight drop in growth margin by a half a point is mainly the result of the conversion effect. The negative effect of currency hedges was offset by gains on optional hedges. Furthermore, increases in our cost prices were slightly above our budget assumptions, but these were offset by the leverage effect of production costs, fixed production costs, as well as exceptional sell-through rates, both in fashion, métiers, as well as other activities.
Communication spending, reaching EUR 200 million in the first half of the year, reaches EUR 525 million after speeding up increasing numbers of events in the second half of the year. Other sales and administrative expenses, including among other things, wage costs for both sales staff and support staff, as well as variable rent, reaching EUR 2.2 billion, expresses a percentage of sales. This is generating a leverage effect on operating profitability of a half a point versus 2021. Other income and expenses reaching EUR 836 million. This mainly means depreciation of tangible and intangible assets, firstly, and secondly, usage fees. The expense of EUR 61 million booked in 2022 due to the new five-year commitment to the Hermès Foundation, is offset by a reduction in the cost of free share plans.
Recurring operating income, therefore, reaches EUR 4.7 billion, which is up 33% compared to 2021. Recurring operating profitability reaching a record level, 40.5% of sales, is an exceptional level and improvement by more than 1 point compared to 2021. Financial results are an expense of EUR 62 million as opposed to EUR 96 million in 2021. This includes currency hedge costs as well as lease liabilities and interest income reaching EUR 75 million, which explains the positive change in financial results. Income tax, EUR 1.3 billion, representing an effective tax rate of 28.2%. The drop by 1.2 points compared to the reported rate for 2021 is due to the reduction in corporate tax in France, going from 28.4% to 25.8%.
Net income from associates, reaching EUR 50 million is a reflection of strong momentum of our business in the Middle East. Net income, EUR 3.4 billion, which is up 38% compared to 2021. The improvement in recurring operating profitability and the improvement in interest paid on cash means that we've got a record profitability level of 29%, up almost 2 points compared to 2021. Since January 1, 2022, we've applied the IFRIC ruling on recognition of IT projects using the SaaS mode. EUR 50 million, which previously would have been capitalized, has now been booked as an expense during the period.
After investing EUR 190 million in the first half of 2022, the group speeded up investments in the second half of the year, making EUR 518 million of investments in 2022. EUR 214 million were spent on refurbishments and extensions of the retail network, inter alia, with the construction of our flagship in New York, Madison 706, whose grand opening was last September. The main projects are in China as well as the United States. EUR 192 million were spent to strengthen production capacity, inter alia, on projects for new leather production sites, as well as sites for silk, perfumes, and watches.
Lastly, EUR 113 million, or EUR 163 million, using the same accounting methods, were invested in digital IT systems as well as real estate to support group development. Over a three-year period, Hermès has boosted its operational investments by EUR 1.5 billion, which is about 60% of this in France. Cash flow, EUR 4.1 million, up 34% year on year at the same pace as operating income. Change in working capital requirements, this is a net resource of EUR 73 million in 2022. The controlled increase in inventory was offset by increase in operational debt. After taking into account operational expenditure we just mentioned, as well as repayment of lease liabilities, available cash flow after adjustment, reaches EUR 3.4 billion.
Hermès International bought back EUR 104,000 for, and paid EUR 852 million in dividends. Other changes are mainly due to increased value of currencies versus the euro, and our cash. Net restated cash position, up EUR 2.7 billion, reaching EUR 9.7 billion at the end of December 2022. Ordinary dividend, which will be up for approval at the annual general meeting slated on 20 April, will be EUR 13 per share, which is a payout of 40%. Cash represents over 50% of our total assets. Shareholders' equity reaching over EUR 12 billion, representing 70% of our liabilities. The group has consolidated a strong financial structure, enabling it to preserve its independence and continue pursuing its long-term strategy. Thank you for your attention.
I'd like to give the floor back to Axel, who'll be talking to us about the outlook.
Merci. Thank you, Éric. Thank you for these results. I now come to the outlook of the group unchanged. In 2023, the group begins the year with confidence, thanks to its unique model, which deploys around its value, our values of independence, entrepreneurial spirit, craftsmanship, and creativity. We continue our dynamic carried forward by all the teams worldwide, and it is therefore with pride and gratitude that we close 2022. Astonishment will be the theme of this new year. Inspiration of creation in Hermès, the capacity to astonish is a constant source of innovation and momentum for the house, which will continue to accompany its customers with enthusiasm and creativity in 2023. We pursue our momentum for job creation, multi-local and multi-sector, as well as our investments in production capacity.
With the opening of leather good workshop in Louviers and the Sormonne namely, we continue to accompany our suppliers and all our partners. We will also be investing in our retail network, the omni-channel retail network, with opening and enlargement of stores such as that of Chengdu and The Peninsula Beijing in China, Naples and Chicago in the USA, and Bordeaux in France. 2023, once again, will be a year of encounter with the public. The ephemeral Grand Palais will be welcoming the 13th edition of the show Hermès in March in Paris, and also a year of creativity to surprise our customers. The 5th chapter of beauty around the eyes will be unveiled in the autumn.
Finally, our fourth five-year mandate to start in 2023 for Hermès Corporate Foundation, which pursues its commitments in the field of education, awareness raising of youth in the fields of craftsmanship, the living arts, and solidarity. In conclusion, I wish once again to thank our teams and our customers everywhere in the world. We are now, with Éric, ready to take your questions.
Now questions from the room. Afterwards, we will ask people to ask questions online. We're leaving it up to you to select who asks the questions. Good morning to both of you. I'm from Citi. Three questions. Firstly, on leather, Axel, you talked about a baseline comparison, which is easy in Q4, but for full year 2022, growth up 16% organic. I think that's a little bit different for long-term growth. About long-term growth, can you explain the distinctions, price volume mix? What are the effects that explain this ex-extra growth? What are your expectations for 2023 in this division? Next, price hikes. You talked to Eric about Q3, an increase in prices, which would be high single digits between 7%-9% is my assumption. Could you specify this percentage?
This is more than in recent years where your price increases were fairly modest, as opposed to certain other fashion houses. Should we assume that it's sort of a catch-up effect versus catching up with some of your direct competitors? A third question, operating profitability over 40%, almost 41%, if we remove the EUR 60 million from the foundation. Is this the new benchmark for your profitability? The new expectation for the medium term for this group with now over EUR 12 billion in revenue, which is well above profitability in the 10 years previous. Leather. Representative growth as end of September, which was 12%.
Our guidance is unchanged on that. It's still a volume and capacity effect, 6%-7%. 6% or 7% and a price effect as well. The speed up that took place in terms of Q4 percentage was due to the comparison baseline. Really bear in mind the end of September growth, which is more normative, which is more in the neighborhood of 12%. 6-7 volume plus price effect. Price effect, yes. We mentioned this for Q... on, in Q3 results. Average price increase is 7%, yes, in 2023, as things stand currently. Fairly uniform increases in geographies. One exception, though, is Japan, a little bit higher due to the depreciation of the JPY, and not quite as big increases in the U.S. because the USD had reached higher rates.
We continue with our rationale or basic rationale to pass on to price hikes. In the Euro area, we pass on our increased cost prices. This, we also take into account currency fluctuations marginally.
I don't know, would you like to add a point? Let me just make a last point on profitability. 40%, takeaway point here, I think is what I've tried to convey in my messages. A strong increase, speed up in our hiring in the second half of the year, a speed up in our investments, in our communication spending, and spending on hiring, spending on our sales force, spending on logistics, boosting production capacity. The full year effect, we can see this reflected in the figures in the second half, and this is gonna amplify further next year, be strengthened further. That's why you can't extrapolate that profitability.
Well, I think there are three things that I'd like to specify which are quite global. First of all, you don't manage the group on a quarterly basis. Last year, between the fourth Q results of leather, which was not very good, that was linked to the fourth Q the year before, which was good. Since we were closed before that, we'd sold everything in the fourth quarter. But the basic trend remains, we have a very good result on leather, which has a great desirability, et cetera. Secondly, in our decisions, we don't try to look at or do a catch up with the industry. Pierre-Alexis, father, used to say something that I like, is, "I don't look at what others are doing. I may just get influenced," you know? We spare ourselves, you know, that.
I say this, very clearly, we do not have a you know, marketing price policy. I've read in certain reports, that the Citi not to have that. That's our strategy, that's linked to our manufacturing costs. Talking one of the other houses saying, "Because you're an artisan, we are luxury, but you are artisans." That's true. Hours of work on a bag, are what they are. It's not the prices, because the market asks us. You can't reverse the content principle is, I can because I must, or is, I must because I can. No. We can increase our prices more, but the idea is to keep a certain logic. Why is it stronger this year?
It's not because we're catching up with the industry, because quite clearly a bag is 15 hours of manual work. As you've seen, we've taken salary measures to accompany the employees strongly, so we've got increase in the salary costs, which are integrated into our prices. Lastly, you never manage the group, sorry, Éric, I hope you won't take advantage. For financial reasons, we do the operational, we put the investments that we need to, and we, you know, because of the strong growth, we plan investments in our stores, in our infrastructure, in IT, in logistics, and recruitment. We make the investments that are needed for the long-term growth. Thanks to this investment and the good work of the teams that I salute here, that you come to a strong profitability.
A profitability that, which is to me, sorry for complimenting myself, it seems admirable for 2022. We are not starting from the profitability saying, "How do we, you know, get that?" No. It'll depend on a lot of things. As you know, we are an industry with fixed costs, with rents and salaries and rents, and then collections that sell, you know, more or less, depending on the works, work of my dear cousin and the production of the other cousin.
Mm-hmm.
Bonjour. Luca Solca, Bernstein. [Foreign language].
I was wondering whether you could actually give us, shed some light on the dynamic of... Or momentum of demand by nationality. I think these last months, much has been said about recession and the risk for the economy, and not enough has been said about the desire to live that one sees in up-market consumers, and I'm thinking of the figures that are demonstrating this quite clearly. If we could talk about the magnitude of the rebound or the boost that we're seeing in China. If the Chinese were to embrace the same attitude, you know, that you only live once, that we've seen in the U.S. and in Europe, then maybe that could give a big boost to demand of these consumers, their consumers.
Maybe one detail on growth in Europe, excluding France, which seems less strong in Q4. I'm wondering whether this is a deliberate choice of allocation of products rather than a signal regarding demand for these countries. Within this framework, if you could provide us with some figures in terms of increase in capacity. 2023, I think, the importance would be to find ways to satisfy demand rather than not having enough demand. Thank you. Yes, that's a problem that I wish upon us, Luca. Several subjects here. As an aside, no. You know, I don't choose the questions, so you won't choose the answer, but I'd like to thank you. You're not very desired in Hermès.
You wrote a memo, where you said Hermès is best in CSR and the worst to make it known. I spoke with complacency about the good results that we've had in CSR with the CDP, et cetera. It's you, because we said we must communicate more. Maybe we're not very good at communicating outside, thanks to you know, because of what you said. I think that we have not a good reading of our industry, what is our industry. Our industry has functioned very well because all over the world, mainly in Asia and in the USA, there's been a middle class, larger in number, younger and richer. I don't need to have 300 stores, to what you call a very high customer.
60 stores in the world are if enough people travel. You know what. You got cities, world cities, Paris, Dubai, et cetera. I think what really happened and which shook up Europe a little, and you see arriving in China, in the U.S.A., a middle class, new customers who don't necessarily buy our most expensive products, but who are part of this success to, you know, please themselves. That is also why we see that all the métiers are functioning. For some, it is a piece of ready-to-wear. We have never sold as much because it's not the most representative métiers is the tableware, dinner sets. The pleasure of receiving people at home or breakfast set, jewelry which is much more bought for oneself than for gifts.
All of this makes up for the success of Hermès. It's more a middle class, which is larger and more dynamic, that is coming. This is a personal opinion, but do you know that for a long time, when the luxury industry, we said, "Oh, they're arriving, big competition," because people want to go to the spas, to the restaurants. Yes, for two years, it was better to be selling handbags than a spa with COVID times, you know, in the COVID times. We saw all of the competition in the luxury market with different luxury products to leave us that room.
My last point before coming to Europe, it's not for me to make a comment on the figures of others, but what I can say is that we have seen a strong situation in China where with big progression, double-digit growth, for the last two years, whatever be the quarter, including the fourth quarter, with the great attractiveness and the boost, the rebound in China took place as soon as Chengdu and Wuhan, sorry, opened in 2020. We see this momentum and the attractiveness that Hermès represents. We had a fourth quarter in China, which doesn't allow us to, you know, make a comment to explain the situation of others. Hermès is often affected afterwards, so I won't be the canary in the mine.
Europe, quite strong, and of course, you have different situations, but we have 18.5% for Europe in the year. I started my career where I would have liked to present +18%, but now that you're telling me, "Why only 18%?" You know? I think Europe is very diverse. They've been impacted, sorry to remind you, with the closure of Russia. We had, I didn't make the calculation in Russia to give you a figure, but we were impacted by the decision that we have taken to suspend our business in Russia totally, which was also, you know, important source of growth in Europe. Scandinavian countries are doing very well. It's very pleasant to see good results that you can have in Norway, in Sweden, Copenhagen.
Germany is doing well. Italy, good rebound. Spain is slightly more difficult, but we opened a store in Barcelona. Everything really depends, once again, on the macroeconomic trust and the dynamism of each, the middle class in each country. I think that's enough capacity. We do what we can. He's part of the family so, I have to keep him. What can I do? No, no. The capacity. Well, we have our rules to produce as much as possible while maintaining quality and having the raw material available. For leather, we can't recruit more than 300, or rather creating more than 250, 300 jobs per year because it requires a lot of trainers, requires a lot of training. We're really looking at long-term trends here because can't make an exception to that.
The question that arises for us over and beyond the production capacity is, our capacity to find good raw material. I'm a part of those who complains on a very intensive industrial, you know, animal breeding that drops quality. We don't always have the quality that we want. In Hermès, when you don't have the quality that you want, you cannot produce. That's one of our specificities. We really invest. In 2023, what we will see, but the industrial time is longer than that of our craftsmanship as compared to retail. We'll continue to make investment, do vertical integration for a lot of métiers, a lot of sectors, 'cause each sector is gaining a certain size, we'll be making investment in jewelry, in Hermès Maison, perfumes.
Is it a way of answering to your previous question on the margin? We plan to make heavy investments to accompany a group which has you know, deeply grown in terms of capacity. I wish that the reason that we don't have any problem of production and demand, and, you know, I'll be happy with that.
Hello, I'm from BNP Paribas Exane. First of all, thank you for hosting this meeting in such a beautiful store. I love it very much. I come here very often. Don't buy a lot of handbags, though. Question though, for brands such as yours, same for Patek Philippe, Rolex, and Ferrari. How do you find an Hermès bag? It's a highly exclusive product and can also be deemed almost the opposite of exclusiveness. The idea is to refuse access to some people, access to these products. The question is whether people want to buy an Hermès brand handbag or use that money for some other product. Second question, China. You said double-digit for Q4. Asia, +25%, assuming it's the same figure for China. The figure is so different from the other houses.
In Q4, what we saw, people in China were afraid to go to malls. In the past, you also explained that you had less mall exposure there, and there were waiting lists. Somebody who ordered a bag maybe 2 years ago could get it delivered to their home. Could you give us further explanations for this difference? I think in the industry, it's mainly -20%, sometimes -25% in Q4. Question number 3, you strongly increased your dividend, EUR 13 per share for a share that is worth 700, 1,700, around EUR 10 billion in cash. You mentioned your desire to maintain your independence. We can understand after various effects, COVID effects and so forth, a luxury company of course may be afraid that China would invade Taiwan, but EUR 10 billion is an awful lot of money.
Without any special dividend or bigger share buyback, what might the possibilities be to use that cash on hand? Thank you.
No. Merci pour la question.
Thank you for the questions. First of all, mainly, well, let's begin by what's important to all of us, handbags. Absolutely. Well, look at the year. Leather goods up 16%. We sold 16% more bags. We're not trying to limit production. We're not artificially creating selectivity. We're trying to produce as many as we can. We must remember that, be aware of that fact. I remember when we had 250 artisans and bags that weren't selling well way back when. My first internship at Hermès, we had 56% of our sales were silk, 9% of our sales were with leather, and we had 250 artisans, and we didn't manage to sell many Kellys or Birkin. Things have certainly changed, and I can remember the time it changed. All of a sudden, we became hugely desirable.
I'm not answering directly, but my mother was in charge of production. My father, Pierre-Alexis' father, led Hermès, and their question was: How can we grapple with this? We want to continue growing our revenue. We want to be high performance. We want to continue being serene and moving forward at the same time. We talk about entrepreneurships. We are entrepreneurs, and we want to move forward. To make more, maybe we should have them made by machine, but it wouldn't be the same bag. We thought, "Okay, well, that's the way it is." Our stores have to make do. We're not gonna change the bags, make them easier to make, and then people make do. The French did something or other. The Japanese has set up 10-year waiting lists and so on and so forth.
We changed all of that. The waiting, 10-year waiting list is also a problem which people wondered about. Some customers can reserve, and we've also got a portion of bags during the day that are made available so that everybody has an opportunity to get a bag. We certainly don't try to hold things back. Our bags are a great way of winning over new customers. Very often, people would say, for instance, they want to give a bag to their wife for the 40th, her 40th birthday, and they're able to do so. This sometimes is somewhat bothersome, but it's a question of opportunity or luck. If you're there at the right place at the right time, you can get your hands on a bag.
You know full well, just as I do, we do have a problem in our stores. We've got our genuine customers, but there are also some people who come back to resell the products. We want to sell to genuine customers who are going to buy these bags for themselves. The reselling marketplace is a different situation. You've mentioned other houses. There was an article in a U.S. newspaper recently saying there are four companies that are reselling the products at a higher price than the original. Patek Philippe, Hermès, and others are in that situation, where the resellers sell the products at higher prices. The question is, are these genuine customers in our stores or are these distributors that are buying the products to resell them that are not authorized distributors?
Unfortunately, I mean, we're the number one victim of this, and our customers to some degree are victims as well, because sometimes they may end up buying a fake bag or buying a bag elsewhere at a higher price than they would have paid in one of our stores. This is why on the bags there's some ambiguity, but we want to make as many bags as possible, have as many people as possible to buy them. It's a marvelous product. I talked about the 202,000 repairs. When you see a granddaughter come along with her grandmother's Kelly bag, and we can repair it for her, and it gets a new life, that it can lead with her, we love that.
I want there to be more, as many people as possible worldwide to have an Hermès bag, so they can really see the difference of a bag that gets a Rupertina, that's not like plastic, that's not coated, what it feels like, that's sustainable over time, the linen thread and so forth that it's sewn with. It's a beautiful way to have high impact, great image. China, I don't know if I should comment on this to tell you about our difference, positive difference versus the others. I can say that I believe sometimes maybe people tend to overdo things in talking about the health crisis in China, for two years now. I mean, sometimes a neighborhood shut down in Shanghai, or sometimes a neighborhood is shut down in Xi'an.
Of course, I'd rather not see a neighborhood shut down in Shanghai versus a smaller city. If you close down a neighborhood that has a bigger store, that's more of a problem than a neighborhood that has a smaller store. Anyhow, what did we see in December with the opening? We saw, quite amazingly, a wave that started in Beijing, when, after they opened up and people started falling ill. To be honest, it didn't re-reduce our number of customers. It reduced the number of salespeople to open our stores. A significant number of our salespeople fell ill. Amongst our employees, it tended to be a very slight case. They stayed home, nobody, none of our employees were hospitalized and fell seriously ill. That's a great thing.
The health of our employees is a number one consideration of ours. Has been over this period. We see strong demand. The Chinese New Year, you're familiar with what I say from year to year. The Chinese New Year is always a different time of week of the year. Every year it changes week, so it's really hard to know trends until the full first quarter. We'd look at the long-term view. Take the long-term view. Q4 shut everything down, so people. Should we have shut things down so that we could have a knock-on, positive knock-on effect for Q1? What about pop-up stores and so forth? What we saw in our situation was the Chinese customer base very much wants Hermès products from all the various sectors, all of our product lines. Yes.
Everybody's got their view as to whether it's enough, not enough, and so forth. You're right. In absolute terms, due to the Hermès share price that's held up well, not always encouraged by some of the analysts that say neutral or sell. Despite a financial performance that's really excellent. I can remember the share price when I became CEO. We stand at EUR 1,700 now. It's certainly gone up. We've performed beautifully. Our yield, therefore, is not that high, especially with interest rates going up in a big way. Traditionally, our payout rate, we increase it to 40%, but it's lower than the average of the CAC 40 corporations. This is in line with my rationale.
Part of this goes to dividends, part goes to reinvestments, and part of it's held in store and on reserve for any possible tough times ahead. This really helped us during COVID. We shut everything down. We were able to say, sorry to remind you, we keep everybody employed, we pay all of our employees, and we don't take any government subsidy. Independence means a freedom, being more free than others. On the other hand, that said, dividend does grow, yes. It's an exceptional year. We don't. We try to remain reasonable and take the long-term view. Have ambitious targets together with Eric. Let me add a point. In addition to the increased dividend, we've been focusing sharing value with our employees. Axel repeated this.
Think of significant increases in profit sharing, as well as the bonus of EUR 4,000, which are helping share the added value with our employees. Yes, mainly, let's put it this way, if you look at the bonuses we've given, profit sharing, shareholding, we're talking about overall EUR 250 million. This is a lot of value sharing with our employees. Now, after tough times, it's good to see that there are good times and the dividend needs to reflect this. It's not at all a bad thing. Thank you.
Bonjour. Hello. Morgan Stanley, Eduard. On the growth algorithm, that is an important question for investors. Just to come back to 2022, you've had increase in prices by 4%, that's what you'd indicated, with an organic growth of 23. We're at 19 of impact, mixed volume. I think you won't give us the exact figure, but can you give us a qualitative explanation of the volume and mix in 2022? For 2023, the growth of volume, is there a reason for which the growth of volume in 2023 will be lower or higher than 2022? It's, I guess yes or no, it's relatively simple. Please, yes. Link to this, what are the constraints amongst your external suppliers?
Are the same constraints as for you? Last question on the cosmetics. I know it's still small for you, but in 2020 you come into makeup. Globally, the performance up until now, and then are they in line with your expectations? Can you tell us about your future projects? A lot of questions. Well, it's interesting. Your question's interesting because that's not how we reason in Hermès, and I think that's really part and parcel of our strength of resilience as compared to other houses. We don't separate between the price and volume. We separate in three. We have the price, the scope, and volume. Others tend to mix scope and volume. That's a mistake because often you can have a strong scope effect.
You think you're doing volume. When you start amortizing the CapEx, the scope effect, you come to a different story. It's true that for some years, we had growth based on volume rather than scope and price. For 2023, I am now gonna give you the budget and our objectives, et cetera, but we do say that there is a higher growth in price because we're going from 4%-7%. We'll see. Where the answer is more than just yes or no, sorry about that. You know, you have a company, and come back a bit to finance, a company that has grown a lot without using its working capital requirements. That's not the normal rule because the we've had a sell-through of our inventory, which is incredible.
We are lacking inventory sometimes and can sometimes create a frustration of certain customers who come to the store. We are going to create a volume and an increase because we have an increase of our production capacity. We'll have less, so in 2022, this sell-through of accumulated inventory, which we don't have anymore. It's all going to be a clever sort of balance to project ourselves. The idea, I know this is of interest to our investors and the financial system and the model, you know, the latitude one can have, the perpetual growth can have in the end. We are putting ourselves in a place to have a perpetual growth higher than the model, which has more impact than to know what I'm gonna do in 2023 in terms of growth.
That's also the strength of Hermès, that's why we are doing well in this adventure, this, the stock market, because we have a perpetual growth which for the moment is quite high, and that is what I try to preserve. Sorry for this technical bit. For our suppliers, we treat them like ourselves. We looked at the top 50. Top 50 suppliers have been there for over 20 years. The average, you know, relationship, the seniority is 20 years. What is a little new, but as the English call the growing pains, we've grown so much that we have limits of production everywhere with a strong demand, a very strong demand. We'll do our best in our way of doing things.
That is to say guaranteeing quality of the product, which is complicated. You know, it's an everyday...
Battle. In our decisions, it's more difficult in the way of managing. Some suppliers we don't work with because they're not commensurate with our quality. Others, when you bring somebody in, it takes time to get them up to scratch, we do a lot of training. That is our specificity as well. We sometimes sell trainers to our suppliers to bring them up in capacity. All our sectors have worked well, and we'll have production limits, constraints everywhere, and we'll try and do our best. We'll have ambitious growth, but with constraints. The last point, look, for beauty, maybe we were not ambitious enough in the beginning, but now we are above our hopes in sales, and we continue.
The next step, which will take a little more time because we also want to have a product, which is exceptional, which will take us into cosmetics. Personally, I like Hermès, and I think we've done an incredible lipstick. It still holds very well, and it'll be a good moisturizer for the lips, and it's. The quality, staying power, everything looks fantastic. The effort that we make is to make a product which is as beautiful and good as possible. Otherwise, we don't make it. So much for beauty. Merci beaucoup. Adrien Tasé, Financial Times. Thank you. From the Financial Times. Briefly, you talked about the halting of sales in Russia last year.
Of course, it's a very small proportion of your sales, but I still wonder, what is the current situation considering we're coming toward the one-year mark after the invasion? What are your longer-term plans for Russia? For the time being, we've suspended our business in Russia. We've not resumed it. At any rate, now there are EU sanctions on products of a certain amount. I think it's EUR 300. It's a price point above basically all of our products. We spend a lot of time assisting our local Russian teams. That's really our priority. We've booked in our financials all of our Russian exposure. Above and beyond business considerations, we very much hope that the hostilities will end.
It's very difficult to have any knowledge, any timing right now, as to when the war will stop, when the fighting will end. For the time being, we're on standby. No microphone is being used. Small number of teams, we were able to transfer some employees elsewhere. We've suspended business, but we still have people in our offices and so forth.
Oui, bonjour. Aurélie. Good morning. From HSBC. 3 questions. Firstly, beginning of year trends, I would wonder about, would you like to flag anything? Would you say we could extrapolate Q4 growth, restating it for the baseline effect, of course? 2nd question, welcoming Chinese consumers into your stores, which will begin arriving more and more during the year. Will you be hiring employees? There are already long waiting lines, just the local consumers.
How are you preparing for the arrival of these Chinese customers? A last question I might have, other Hermès sectors, the other métiers, year after year, you talk to us about beautiful performance for jewelry. I was wondering, what's its proportion of your revenues today? Thank you. Yes, several questions there. I'll let you stick your neck out regarding Q1. Just let me say, we're not seeing any change in the trend. The Chinese New Year is always a different date. It's a major event in the first quarter, just like Christmas is a major event in Q4. Since the day changes for Chinese New Year, that can shift some figures around and make it possible to extrapolate and interpret. I'd rather you wait to get the actual figures when Eric gives you the Q1 results.
We'll find out. For the time being, let me just say, we're not seeing any change in trend. I guess I'm old-fashioned, but I love welcoming customers in stores. I love it. I remember the chairman of a Japanese department store, once a month, he would open the store, the CEO himself, and he would welcome the customers. When I'm a little stressed, I go downstairs at the Faubourg store. Yes, I do. I meet with people. I shake people's hands and so forth and thank them for coming to the store. No one has to come to Hermès, so we're happy when they do. I constantly enjoy seeing these people come to our stores. We will welcome the customers wherever they come from. Next. That's what makes our business model slightly different.
I've always observed this. Now we have more data. The very good customers tend to buy nearer to their homes. That's my theory and what we've seen. We're ready to welcome them. People buy near by their homes, fashion items, furniture, tableware, and so forth. We've got our local anchor. This is always our approach. We serve local customers in local urban areas. The big customers continue doing this. There'll be renewed tourism, things are opening up, and that's certainly good news. Time will tell. Let's not expect all the new Asian tourists will rush to Europe. There are gonna be major tourism flows to Hong Kong, which is opening up again, major flows to Japan. We've seen this. We'll see a lot of tourism within Asia.
We very much believe in that. It has been the case for a long time. How will we accommodate them? Well, we had a year with +23% already. You said this kindly, but we've already begun, and we see these volumes and don't have enough salespeople and space. We'll continue investing in hiring and in store space. We're continuing in 2023, recruiting a lot of people, recruiting for production, a lot of people recruiting for sales, where there's a great deal of demand. That's our strength at Hermès. We're multi-local. This helped us a lot during COVID. People couldn't travel. We were able to have everybody make do on their own. We tested out multi-local, worked very well. Each country managed based on its own demand and so forth. Eric helped a little bit every now and then.
We have multi-local targets, and as you've seen, in 10 years, we doubled number of group employees. 2023, we'll probably see a further large increase in employee numbers. Let me add that for several years now, the groups had a strategy of enlarging stores, having more and more flagship stores. This is a strategy you can see, which has enabled us to have organic growth, strong volume growth organically. In that way, we can absorb this increased flow of customers, and fluctuations in customer flow. Next point, regarding other sectors, I often talk about jewelry. This was the first métiers I worked in when working at Hermès, and I can say that it's done very, very well since I left it. It's grown a great deal.
I've got; it's just got a special place in my heart. There were nine of us in the jewelry métiers when I took charge of it. It's certainly grown. There are home métiers and jewelry métiers and so forth. All in all, EUR 1.3 billion in revenue this year, which compared to 10 years ago, it's about a half of all of Hermès' revenue when I took over as CEO. Of course, you can't have one preferred child, but jewelry does have a special place in my heart.
Bonjour, David Da Maia.
David Da Maia, CIC. Two questions for me. The first one, I want to come back to the impressive performance of the fourth quarter. Over and beyond the strong desirability of your brand, I was wondering whether to a certain extent the anticipation purchase effect because of the hike in price that you've announced in the beginning of the year hasn't sort of explained this very good performance. In the beginning of the year, do you observe a slowing down of the volumes because you have little inventory in the store? Second question related to this on the generous salary policy in 2022, can you give us in % the evolution of your payroll and what you plan in 2023 to see the effect that it may have on your results? Two subjects.
Except for Japan, where it's statutory, where you announce in advance the increase in price and it does have an effect on sales before and after. Our price announcements, we don't see any strong effect outside of Japan. They're very sensitive to announcement in price increase. No, and I have to say, because we've increased our prices, that there's no change in trend. The payroll, of course, there's an inflation, and we wanted to accompany our employees, and so in that in 2022, and then you'll have the effect on 2023, because for each employee, demographically, I'll take the example of France. For France, it's EUR 100 gross in January 2022, EUR 100 gross in July.
We'll have the full year effect up until July 2023. We had a bonus of EUR 4,000 plus more or less. Stop me if I shouldn't be saying so. An increase, general increase of 6%. All of this means that for a median salary, we have an increase of above 10% for 2023, which offsets, you know... I spoke about bonus profit sharing, which represents approximately EUR 250 million for the group, and represents three months' worth of salary, like over three months. You're looking at for a French employee, a payment of 17 months. Statutorily it's 13 months, one month for seniority and two, three months in terms of profit sharing. It's paid on the value of 17 months. I can't sort of model it in yourself, but anyway.
We have the desire, strong desire, to accompany our employees within the framework of a complicated situation, also within the framework of a success. The bonus was useful for our employees in a complex situation. It would have been received in the, you know, given the good results of the group in this situation.
Bonjour.
Bonjour.
Hello. Carole Madjo, Barclays. Two questions. First, coming on tourism. American consumers traveled a lot in 2022. Do you think this trend will continue in 2023, or the price increases that you made in January will have reduced the price gaps between regions, and so, there won't be that same attraction for the American consumers to come to France to buy? In terms of margins, you spoke about, second semester 2022, higher investments. 2023, the margin of 39% for semester two will be a good base for the following year. I'll let Eric answer about the margin. Without worrying anybody, we don't know. We'll see. Anyway, tourism. I think in 2023 we'll see that tourism will continue and open with the desire of people to travel more. Will they travel? When I read the press, will they be coming to France?
I think there'll be a lot of inter-Asia tourism, in America zones as well, people traveling in the region. Like everybody, we depend upon the central banks and the US dollar. A priority that we had at the end of the year, there was influx of tourism at the end of the year, and there was an opportunity cost, so to speak. Our customers are not affected by this opportunity cost, but it's the pleasure of being in Paris more. I don't see, after the increase in price, a reduction in tourism. Once again, our priority is local customers. We don't try to sort of play on price differential with the hope of having zones where we will maximize a tourism flow. The idea is to maximize local customers where we are.
The Italian stores are for Italians, Japanese stores for the Japanese, et cetera. Then there's the tourists, so we receive them as best as possible, and we're delighted they're there. The strategy of the group is not based on capturing the tourists, and we haven't seen any trend with the dollar having gone up, prices increase, or rather the euro having gone up a little bit, et cetera. It has an impact on travel. With Wilfried, 2003, this, the yen, which had gone up, and fewer Japanese tourists were coming to Paris all of a sudden. At that time, we were looking after Japan instead of looking after France. Sometimes, you know, currency parities play more than the quality of the management. Lesson of humility.
We don't give profitability targets. I would emphasize the speed up, acceleration of things in H2. We've been cautious and really did things in China in the first half. I have given you some figures. In the first half, -EUR 200 million in CapEx, +EUR 300 million in the second half. Admin expenses under EUR 1 billion in the first half, reaching EUR 1.2 billion in the second half. Communication spending, less than EUR 200 million, went to EUR 330 million in the second half. We resumed some events that had been frozen. Recruiting 300 people first half, went up to around 1,300 people in the second half. Add to this wage increases Axel mentioned, 6% plus the EUR 100 bonuses, median wage going up by around 10%.
That's what you have to factor into your forecasts, realizing that we're in an industry that's all about fixed costs. Most important thing at the top line, and we're highly ambitious on that.
This is interesting because traditionally we're a company that spends more in the second half of the year than the first. This is logical because we had more sales because of Christmas. Now all our months are very important, and we've continued this ratio where we spend more in comm, communication. Saying, "Oh, you know, it's the end of the year, I must make my investments in the second half." It's not that. It's traditionally we've had more CapEx and comm second half of the year.
Bonjour. Juliette Garnier for Le Monde, the newspaper. I wanted to have you talk about the beauty sector.
Today, how many points of sale are the Hermès beauty lines are they sold? Will you have the ambition of building a factory entirely dedicated to the production of cosmetic products? Can you say a few words about your investments underway alongside Limoges, close to Limoges, for decoration of porcelain? I think it's a big project. How many points of sale? About 100. You know, the answer is that it changes every day. We are, I'd understood, around 300. You are close. It takes place. If possible, we would put it everywhere. It's Hermès stores, 1. There are a lot in the digital. You can't sell makeup on the digital. Hermès digital and non-Hermès digital and selected points of sale. Isetan in Japan, Hankyu and Meitetsu. They're superb. I've just come back from that. Galeries Lafayette.
We're in the big departments. At Harrods. That's a big success. You know, we like to control production, and that is why there's already over 40, 50 years, we decided to have a bottling factory for perfume. Took time to make it profitable. Why not have a production workshop? What stands us apart in Hermès from the rest of the industry is that the first source of employment in Hermès is artisans and production. We are always in favor of, but it must make sense. We need to have the know-how. To go into the details, we try to choose. When we don't have the know-how, we try to choose the best manufacturer with their qualities.
To give you an example, we didn't choose the same manufacturer to make makeup, the glossy ones than for the matte because they wouldn't have the same, you know, level. If you have a factory that doesn't make the matte or the glossy less well, then we won't do it. When I say, and especially to my teams, the product is not an adjustment variable. This is very sincere. We must be able to do as well if not better than the pros, and we are quite difficult when it comes to the selection of the company that will make it and its quality. Contrary to a more simple supply chain where we could have done everything similarly in the same place, no, we've chosen suppliers who are specialized and very specific.
Indeed, I spoke about the success of Hermès and our big production capacity. Well, in this region really, we have two big production centers. One which makes porcelain and also printed enamel. There's a big success of our enamel bracelets; you will be able to admire here just behind you as you leave. On which there's a big capacity, and we've find new capacity because we've in Nontron enlarged the center. We have a printing center as well, a strong printing center. We'll try and bring all of this together and make a new production site around Limoges because there's know-how there. Which has made the success of Hermès grow year after year. We are becoming bigger.
There's a real big subject of growth in Hermès Maison tableware, enamel bracelets. What we call the fashion accessories is strong, I think we'll be creating a center because we're talking about tens of millions of EUR of investment for this. Sorry? I didn't understand where this would be. The answer, it would be around Limoges. By when? A production, a production site is two to three years. We have to find the right place. You know, it's not a fixed rule. Leather workshops have always been in employment basins or, you know, peri-rural areas. That's important for us, we're very careful also about the land, the soil. We take industrial zones that have been previously used and, you know, to reuse them.
We still have some studying to do, but it'll be around Limoges. It'll be between Limoges and Nontron. Thank you very much. We're now going to go on to Q&A, remote Q&A. Sorry; there's a question but off microphone. The both sides are balanced, but we will have the room ask for more question. Please. I've closely, I'm relaxed.
I'm from the Investir magazine. A couple of quick questions. To go back to China, open up in the last year, has there been a shift of their consumption to e-commerce, online selling? Next, to talk about an exceptional dividend. You paid one when the cash level was lower. Maybe you're getting greater interest on cash on hand this year, but still, why are you not considering that? Next point, you talk about difficulties, or rather, well, difficulty in finding quality leather. Do you step in directly with farmers and distributors, and that, of course, could have a positive impact on CSR as well? three points, digital, e-commerce, we have seen skyrocketing in e-commerce during COVID. It's an ongoing, continuing trend. You know, in spite of some questions here, I've never wanted to give % of sales that were digital. It's pointless.
I've always said that's not the way to look at it. The important thing is, how do we serve our customers in the best way? The choice is up to them as to how they make their purchases. During times of COVID, there were 100% of our sales that were online when 80% of our stores were closed. Florian Craen, in charge of retail and digital, we've truly become omnichannel, tells me sometimes, "What do you want?" Depending on where we position products. We have local stores, and we have digital stores. There has certainly been growth.
No, but pardon, excuse me.
Off mic. Let me just say it. For Hermès, there was no drop in store traffic due to any reason whatsoever. Our stores were closed sometimes with not enough salespeople available. I'm sorry I don't say the same thing other people do; other houses do. You can draw your own conclusions. We don't know what the future holds, but we did not see that effect. I won't explain other houses' figures. That's that. You got it. Now, this brings us to... Let me put it this way. Our dividend is up. The ordinary dividend is up. The payout rate is reasonable compared to the CAC 40. Could we have gone higher? Could we have gone lower? Would an exceptional dividend be appropriate considering the nice capital on hand?
We've tried to do the trade-off, look at cash on hand, look at re-yield, look at the IRR, which is an important indicator, and also the dividend. We found that this was right and appropriate and fair. Some people think it's. Some people might think it's too high, but some people would think it's too low, or there should have been exceptional dividend. This means we might have been right if everybody's unhappy. That wasn't what we were trying to do, of course. Now, as to quality of leather, it's a cruel question. You're right, but that's not how it is. We do our utmost. We need farming, breeding that's more extensive, that's much more organic. Let me also remind you. We're the number one company that recovers waste.
No one is breeding an animal for their skin, their leather, but for the meat. What we are trying to do, we now pay for various things in the sector, such as certain vaccinations for cattle. I think the government authorities have to look at this, look at the compensation for farmers. If you look at that population, they've got a very high suicide rate. They're often required to do intensive farming that can be low income, and sometimes the quality of meat goes down. We're, remember, recovering something that would've been thrown away, and we're able to turn it into a magnificent product that's basically eternal. Some of our bags are over 100 years old. It's true magic.
We're the number one company that recovers, that reuses materials and recovers, materials that would otherwise been discarded. I realize people talk about the quality of our leather. We know that it all hinges on the quality of meat consumed. We're talking about important benefits that go well beyond profits. I'd love to talk about that. Other side of the room now for questions because people are wanting to ask questions on that side of the room.
Merci beaucoup. Thank you very much. Just a question on the U.S. You said there's no that the trend has continued, there's no change in trend. Do you see a slowing down of demand with the end of the governmental aids which may impact the middle classes which have been carrying forward the growth? When U.S.A. is a market that's, you know, we have East Coast, West Coast, you have the South, you have the centers, not the same. Each of them have their own logic. I'm not gonna go into the five logics, but we haven't seen any change in trend. Let me take an example. The center, Houston, Dallas, Austin, it's the tech and the energy prices that come into play a bit high.
California is the tech, but it's also the links with Asia because they're open onto the Pacific. That's important. There was a strong flux of remote workers in Florida, so the South functioned well. The place where it's a bit more complex, maybe the Eastern zone. We opened Madison, which was a source of attraction, so we don't feel it, and it continues. There's no change in trend. We do hear in the figures of the retailers, not on our niche, small difficulties, we didn't feel those, and we did an excellent Q4, very strong. They were a bit slow last year. Sometimes in December, they're a bit slow the year before. But. Yeah. No change in trends, great desirability.
It's really micro zones, you know, which. It's very interesting, actually. I think we have a last question online.
We have a question from Zuzanna Pusz from UBS. Please go ahead.
Thank you for taking my questions, apologies they'll be in English. I have three. Maybe first of all, on the performance, in ready-to-wear, specifically by product line, would you be able to remind us specifically what products you have among accessories within that division? You know, am I right to assume that perhaps some categories such as shoes may have driven the division a little bit more? Any color on that would be very helpful. Secondly, on gross margin, in H two, seems like it was a little bit softer at 70.6% despite the strength in leather goods. I would have assumed mix would help.
Would you be able to walk us through the exact drivers of the gross margin in H2? Finally, apologies, follow-up on margins. If we assume basically the continuation of current strong trends in 2023, and as you've mentioned, pricing being somewhat offset by wage increases, I would say, you know, simply asking, can the EBIT margin be up or down or flat? You know, any color on that would be very helpful. Thank you.
No, thank you, Zuzanna, for the question. I will leave the gross margin and the EBIT margin to Éric. I will answer we for the Métier. The Métier which has been incredible and which is not the case all the time has been very good across the board. We were in this incredible position, we took some good decision, and they were met by success. Sometime we took bad decision, and they were met by success also. You know, it's difficult to comment, and it's probably not the standard of what happened.
After all the accessory, what we call accessory, when went well, there is belt, there is fashion accessory, there is hat, there is glove, and there is shoes also. You are right, the shoes is probably one of the highest growth métiers, with jewelry, watches, that we had in 2022. The figure for shoes has been incredibly positive, and I'm very happy and proud of the team and what have been done on that. Regarding the margin, Éric, what can we say?
For the gross margin is quite the same in all métié, and you mentioned all the fashion métié. This is true for men ready-to-wear or women ready-to-wear and shoes. What is key, besides the gross margin rate is the sell-through. Last year we had exceptional sell-through in all these ready-to-wear métié.
Very well. I'd like to first of all thank you for having been as patient in listening to answers. It is with great pleasure indeed that we presented these results to you, which are very solid this year. It's a great pleasure for me, for the employees who did this. We spoke about margins and EBIT margin. We have a intangible capital, which is essential, that of the brand, but that the passion of the employees happy at work. These figures, I think we can say over and beyond what we had forecasted in 2022 because there was a dynamism, enthusiasm in each of our countries, in each of our artisans to come back. It is with great joy that I celebrate these results that we owe to them.
Despite the strength and because the fourth quarter would have been better, we must remain humble. We're not here to teach anybody any lesson. You know, we've adopted a strategic line, an operational line of resilience, which pays off in difficult moments and continues to do so. We are a company of desirability, of creation, we need to reinvent ourselves all the time, as some do. The past doesn't predict the future. I will remain humble and much obliged to the success and really that this great passion for Hermès and its qualities and projecting ourselves with confidence and ambition for the future, but I hope not with pretentiousness and, you know, having come to something that sort of goes without saying. Thank you. Or taken for granted. Thank you.